Even if You Think You Won’t Like First Cow, You Just Might Love First Cow Slate 12/28/2020
In Slate’s
Sorry, got sucked for a moment there into the deliriously palindromic world of
Tenet, which I caught up with on Blu-ray earlier this month. It’s an exhausting movie to think about and that’s true even if you haven’t seen it! Paradoxical in every sense, Tenet was the one picture this year many of us couldn’t see
or get away from. And as Dana suggested in her last dispatch, there’s been something curiously palindromic about the movie’s bizarre, contentious, and still-ongoing rollout: After months of delays, a disappointing theatrical release, and decidedly mixed reviews,
Do Not Trust Google’s Recipe Ratings Slate 12/24/2020
Meathead Goldwyn has some long-standing beef with Google.
For the past nine years, the pitmaster and publisher of AmazingRibs.com one of the internet’s leading authorities on all things barbecue has warned against the tyranny of Google recipe rankings, which determine how and what millions of Americans cook.
Among other things, Google’s algorithms decide which versions of canonical dishes get prime billing in its search results. The search engine cherry-picks and spotlights only the culinary data points it considers important in its “rich” result links and recipe carousels. Google even displays a handy five-star rating alongside recipes from most major food sites, providing a quick shorthand for quality and eliminating the need to click through infinite variations of a dish. If you’re searching for cornbread recipes, you’re probably just going to click the one with five stars or the most ratings next to it.
Inside the Emotional Rollercoaster of Administering the Vaccine Slate 12/22/2020
is a series of dispatches exploring the rollout of COVID-19 immunizations. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Betsy Elswick, a pharmacist and associate professor at the West Virginia University School of Pharmacy, who has been administering the COVID-19 vaccine at pop-up clinics. The conversation has been transcribed, condensed, and edited for clarity by Rachael Allen.
I’ve been in practice 20 years, and this past week was the most emotional but satisfying work week I’ve had in my entire life. We knew the vaccine was coming, and we were prepared to give it as soon as it arrived. When we got the vaccine, there were definitely some tears shed.